(Cover picture courtesy of Goodreads.)

Sometimes, life doesn’t begin until after you’re dead.

Days stretch out in a series of predictable steps. A to B to C to A. Work. Friends. Life. But for some people, it’s not enough. It’s not enough for D. Possessed of a ravenous hunger for more, he’s at a loss for how to find it.

Until he meets Cielle. She’s everything he’s looking for: new and exciting.

And a vampire, which he’s less crazy about.

But when “new and exciting” Turns him, D is forced into an undead life he never anticipated. Trying to adjust to this new existence is hard enough, but he’s about to get more than he ever bargained for.

Will it be enough to sate his hunger?

[Full disclosure: I obtained a free ebook through the blog tour for the series but was under no obligation to review it.  As always, this review is honest.]

Sometimes collaborations between authors work, sometimes not.  Sometimes authors collaborate with their spouses to write a book just like Mia Darien did.  Again, sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn’t.  But in the case of Voracious, it most definitely worked.

D is a man who we have no full name for but that’s about as mysterious as he gets.  He’s just a regular guy at a nine to five job but deep down he yearns to be something more.  In the beginning, the Dariens do a really good job creating this sense of “there’s gotta be more to life” for him, this inescapable energy, this mysterious urge to have something more out of life.  It’s really hard to describe but in the book it is done extremely well.  And it of course leads to D becoming a vampire, lured in by the mysterious Cielle who turns him somewhat against his will.  Being a vampire would certainly add spice to anyone’s dull life but D takes it pretty badly because of the whole “against his will” thing.  In his situation I wouldn’t really do much different but unfortunately his ignoring Cielle despite her pleas leads to her death.  Then D is left to transition to a vampire without a sire and to hunt down the people that killed Cielle.  It’s when he decides to do this that we finally see some of that drive of his satiated as he finds a new role both as avenger, and oddly enough, protector of a woman he saves.

A lot of books with unnamed narrators just don’t work in my opinion.  The author tries so hard to create an air of mystery around characters that it becomes laughable.  However, the Dariens are more than capable of pulling this off.  They depict D’s drive to have something more so well that you start to feel the same as he does by about the end of the second or third chapter.  He is so well written that it’s hard not to connect with him despite his sometimes ethically questionable actions.  He is, in essence, a perfect character because he’s interesting and readers can easily connect to him on an emotional level.  Haven’t we all wanted something more out of life at one point or another?

The plot was pretty amazing.  I really had no idea where Voracious was going for the majority of the book so the ending was kind of a pleasant surprise.  It’s certainly not your perfect fairytale ending but it is emotionally satisfying and you have fewer questions than you do at the beginning of the story.  Of course as always we get to see Sadie (the main character of Cameron’s Law, the first book) through the eyes of another and really appreciate what a great person she is for helping out so much in the supernatural community.  She certainly helped out D during his adjustment period and when he had no choice but to turn another vampire, something that is sort of forbidden for new vampires.  Although the plots of the first two books were fast-paced, Voracious is probably one of the more action-oriented books of the series.  It never sacrifices character development for the plot, though.

As always, the world-building in the Adelheid series is fantastic.  When we meet Sadie she’s already been a vampire for several decades so it was nice to see how a new vampire would be treated, especially since Cameron’s Law was passed and they didn’t have to hide their new abilities.  One of the things I actually liked the most, however, was seeing how the animators in the series work.  We saw an animator bring back a dead person temporarily to get their side of the story in the second book, When Forever Died, but seeing the other uses for animators was fascinating and oddly touching.  Once again, Mia Darien has expanded the world of Adelheid and she’s done it to great effect in collaboration with her husband.  It’s really hard not to love Voracious.

Even if you haven’t read the previous two books, I highly recommend picking up Voracious.  Since every book in the series is only slightly connected and features a different character you can pick up a book anywhere in the series and still enjoy it.  And really, starting with D’s story is as good a place as you’ll get.

I give this book 5/5 stars.

Amazon     Barnes and Noble     Goodreads